When did you start flying business or first?

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livingalmostlarge

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What made you start finding business or first class? Was it hitting a certain age? Was it hitting a search engine portfolio number? Was it making a certain amount of money? Was it retirement? Was it a bad flight? How often do you fly business versus first? Is it always or does it depend on the flight itself and the cost?

I'm trying to convince my mom and I need to think of better things to tell her other than spend her money.
 
I started flying in business and occasionally first when my employer paid for it.

The first time we paid for it was a trip to China and Japan a year after I quit my job. Since then we’ve traveled in business or first in all our long haul trips.
 
In the mid 2010s I was able to upgrade to business/first class several times for an additional fee and caught several good deals. After that I pretty much switched. After Covid which kept us from flying for several years decided only front of the plane from now on. Yes, getting older with likely fewer travel years left also influenced this.

It’s either business class or first. I’ve never been on a flight that had both.
 
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I'd flown business a few times for w*rk. I started flying only business or first for personal travel, 3 years before retiring, when I had solidly hit my number. W*rk had gotten exponentially easier with covid-w*rk-from-home, so I was waiting to retire until the BS bucket overflowed. In the meantime, I had a lot of additional discretionary funds, so I leveled up my travel standards. That's continuing into retirement now, since the 3 additional years of saving & not spending means we're into very low withdrawal rate territory.
 
Mine was business going overseas....

I then made enough trips between my home and NY to get an elite class where they put me in business almost all the time...

We do not buy first class or business... we think it is not worth the money... however, on an international flight from Peru they had some premium or preferred 'coach' that was not that bad and were just like domestic business seats with the extra room... since they were reasonable we bought them...

I just do not see the price being reasonable for what you get... probably 1.5X is where I would be but it seems like it is 10X..
 
I first started flying business class when megacorp paid for my travel in my early 30s. Thereafter I started paying for business class whenever I flew longer than 4 hours. It progressed on to flying business class regardless of duration and we have been doing that for the past 30 years.
 
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We flew first class on special occasions (anniversary) or international trips provided we got a good deal with points. Once we achieved a certain level of wealth - we always fly first class.
 
Started 4,000,000 miles ago. Flew first when young and thankfully it was company policy when I got my job.

The expense is just the cost of living. BTD

Only flew coach once. Quite the experience.
 
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Just checked... and I was right... a RT from Houston to London is 6.7X economy on United and 7.2X on another airline...

My DW is flying back from visiting her mother later and she is on Turkish airlines... it is 10+X to go first class...

Also checked it out... it was Premium Plus that they have on long haul flights... not sure if they charge a lot when booking but we got an email asking us to bid on the seats... we did the minimum and got them... well worth the extra money...

 
I've flown F international for 3 -4 decades, always on mileage tickets. Only in the past 7 years have we actually paid for international business when good mileage routeings are not available.
 
So there wasn't hitting your number? Or age? Or deciding it was time? It seems there is a divide between those who do and those who dont.
 
livingalmostlarge said:
So there wasn't hitting your number? Or age? Or deciding it was time? It seems there is a divide between those who do and those who don't.
Click to expand...
I only flew first class when Northwest, and then later Delta, upgraded me for free. As a Platinum member, when that was the top level, I got upgraded a lot. After saving up over 1.25 million frequent-flier miles*, I flew for free for over a decade until I actually had to pay for my own travel. In fact, I think out of the 2200+ flights I've been on, I only actually paid for maybe 10. And they were all coach seats. And I think they've mostly been on Southwest, Frontier, and Allegiant.

Although since I'm recently retired, (no more w*rk travel) and my Delta Million Miler Status shows me at 969,800 miles, it looks like I'll be paying for Delta tickets for at least 30,200 more miles of travel if I can find reasonable enough fares.

* Too bad Elite bonus miles didn't count towards Million Miler status. But at least they got me extra free flights!
 
I flyed in business class just one time, when potential employer paid for it. It was 4 hours flight and I did not feel anything special about it, except may be food service.
But I started to buy premium economy seats when I turned 55, just because I'm more than 6 feet long and need some space for the legs. It worked perfectly fine so far.
 
livingalmostlarge said:
So there wasn't hitting your number? Or age? Or deciding it was time? It seems there is a divide between those who do and those who dont.
Click to expand...
I started paying for domestic F when--after 1.5 million miles of paid economy--I just couldn't take it anymore. I needed to put in my earplugs and put on my eye shades:
 
I don’t like crowded seating and especially don’t like three seats in a row.
 
Traveling for work spoiled me - I got used to the comforts, and I found I resented going back (I'm lucky I got out just before the company started chopping back on perks - in my day it was business for anything over four hours. And five-star hotels. )
 
ArmchairMillionaire said:
I only flew first class when Northwest, and then later Delta, upgraded me for free. As a Platinum member, when that was the top level, I got upgraded a lot. After saving up over 1.25 million frequent-flier miles*, I flew for free for over a decade until I actually had to pay for my own travel. In fact, I think out of the 2200+ flights I've been on, I only actually paid for maybe 10. And they were all coach seats. And I think they've mostly been on Southwest, Frontier, and Allegiant.

Although since I'm recently retired, (no more w*rk travel) and my Delta Million Miler Status shows me at 969,800 miles, it looks like I'll be paying for Delta tickets for at least 30,200 more miles of travel if I can find reasonable enough fares.

* Too bad Elite bonus miles didn't count towards Million Miler status. But at least they got me extra free flights!
Click to expand...
You need to look for the bonus miles... this was a long time ago since it was Continental airlines...

They just started a new route from NYC to Geneva... sold really cheap tickets and had a bonus and 3X miles... I went to take a long weekend vacation... the guy next to me was flying back the next day... he said this was some of the cheapest miles he found...
 
Wanting to sleep better/longer on overnight flights.
 
Initially flew first class after being upgraded for my frequent flying during w*rk years. After ER, didn't fly first class until our first flight post COVID in 2021. We never went back to coach after that, and only fly first class domestically, and for our upcoming trip to Bahamas. We've flown to Europe several times, and fly Premium on those flights; the seats themselves are equivalent to domestic first class, and there are additional perks.
 
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